Writing Advice

  • Social Media, Writing Advice

    Is social media harming the writing community?

    Is Social Media Harming The Writing Community?
    Is social media harming the writing community?

    Are you a writer or editor spending too much time on social media and feeling bad about it? Is it eating into your writing time, your editing time, your work hours, your free time, etc?

    Social media as slot machine

    Did you know that social media companies employ ‘attention engineers’ who use Las Vegas casino gambling techniques to keep you hooked? And all so they can make a profit at your expense.

    Dr. Cal Newport has compared social media to having a slot machine on your phone. The companies have invested tens to hundreds of millions of dollars to keep you on their sites.

    If you look at their sites a lot, they track user minutes and it increases their stock value.

    Even something as seemingly innocent as the ‘like’ button is a result of attention engineering. Let’s face it, people love getting ‘likes’ because it indicates social approval.

    And humans love social approval.

    Also, there’s a dopamine hit when you get liked, retweeted, and so on, and that can get addictive.

    Social media is designed to take up your attention – and as much of it as possible.

    Social media steals your life, motivations, and goals

    But what are you giving up when you spend hours on Facebook or Twitter?

    You are losing time you can’t get back. Time you could have spent on other things.

    Like writing a book, or finishing the book you’re currently working on. Or writing more books. Or going for walks, swimming, or cycling, etc.

    And at least as importantly, you could have spent more time with your family and other loved ones.

    If you’ve spent a very long time on social media, that time wasted can clock up to years of your life.

    What else could you have been doing with that time? Do you still read as much as you used to, or watch as many films? Do you socialise with others in the real world as much as you once did?

    Social media destroys your focus

    On top of all that, social media is not just a massive time sink, it’s also destroying your ability to focus.

    If you want to write, or you’re editing, you need to concentrate and immerse yourself in that project.

    However, social media has trained users to become more fragmented in their attention. Notifications break your concentration as you rush to check what’s happening online.

    You might intend to only check in for a moment or two, but even if you resist the temptation to stay longer, it will take you longer to focus again on your project.

    So, you’ve actually lost even more time.

    Is social media harming the writing community?

    I often worry about the potential harm caused to writers by online writing communities on social media. Because even if the communities have helpful information, the platforms they use are designed to be addictive.

    Like a slot machine.

    We’re told that the Twitter writing community is helpful and supportive. Yet, someone going in to ask the community a quick question might find they’re still on Twitter an hour or so later.

    That’s time lost to writing, and even if you go back to focus on your work, it’s unlikely you can just immediately concentrate again.

    So, how much are these online communities actually draining writers of time, energy, and focus?

    How much are they actually preventing you from fulfilling your writing dream?

    It doesn’t help that social media provides people with an immediate writing identity. You can put anything in your profile. Once you’re part of the writing community, you get validated, even when you’re posting too much to actually write.

    You end up with an unearned identity. Which fits with the modern tendency to want things now.

    Actual writing success takes a long time. Certainly, if you want to have a sustainable career, it will take years.

    But on social media, you’ll find people claiming social media is necessary for writers.

    Is it?

    It might partly come down to how much you’re able to resist the worst temptations and regulate yourself. I cover useful apps further down this post.

    However, there’s another problem, and it’s a serious one…

    Toxic politics and censorship

    The online writing community can be dangerously political and censorious. This can lead to self-censoring for fear of being attacked, which can block your creativity. There’s far too much herding going on.

    Some writers also use their followers to attack rivals and to bombard reviewing sites with negative reviews. This is reputation destruction, and it’s usually presented as righteous and virtuous.

    But that’s how censors saw themselves in both left-wing and right-wing totalitarian regimes and theocracies. There were a lot of politically captured artists, writers, film makers, editors, and academics in these regimes.

    They used the prevailing ideology to climb the greasy pole. They took out rivals.

    Sometimes rivals were actually sent to the gulag or killed.

    No one admires these regime artists now. When regimes fall, the arts pivot. Those who stood up to censorship and tyranny become lauded while old regime artists fall by the wayside.

    Sadly, people don’t seem to learn the lessons of history.

    That’s another reason why social media is dangerous. It encourages mass bullying, censorship and extremist ideologies.

    Additionally, the algorithms thrive on conflict.

    Nevertheless, if your ideology can’t compete in the marketplace of ideas without you silencing or bullying rivals, then there’s something wrong with your ideology.

    Minority writers living in fear

    And if you’re a minority writer who is now afraid to write fiction based on your own group, because your group is heavily policed by an arrogant and self-appointed activist class, maybe social media is the last place you should be.

    I’m seeing minority writers genuinely afraid of these online tyrants. The so-called ‘allies’ (who belong to the traditional oppressor groups) drown out the voices of ordinary members of minorities – and this is by design.

    We can’t have minorities thinking for themselves or just being individuals.

    If you’re a writer or any kind of artist or thinker, you can’t let these people get inside your head and block your work.

    If you’re a member of a minority or other historically oppressed group, you are not a member of a Borg-like collective, and you are not obliged to write according to the expectations of a grifting middle-class activist class.

    The definition of freedom for minorities should include the definition to be yourself and not a footsoldier for the left, the right, or anyone else.

    I see a lot of fear in the online writing community – fear of the bullies currently running riot. I see fear in publishing because activists have got into positions of power – deliberately too because this is how ideologues capture organisations.

    Even editing organisations are captured.

    Writers have been cancelled while rivals gloat and industry professionals celebrate on the likes of Twitter.

    The more time you spend on social media, the more you’re likely to have these toxic activist voices in your head.

    They will block your ability to produce your best work.

    They will prevent you from writing your own truth.

    And meanwhile, you are likely anxious about what you post – going back to see if you’ve offended some complete stranger from the other side of the planet.

    This is another reason why people often break what they’re doing in the real world to check social media.

    And this leads to anxiety and being trapped on a never-ending hamster wheel of social media posting and reading.

    Is social media worth it?

    I’ve blogged before on apps that are useful to help concentration and focus. But while social media’s attention engineering is hugely immoral, even impacting the human brain, the political aspect adds to the toxic mix.

    Then there is engagement. Twitter can be poor when it comes to engagement. The advice is to engage with other people’s posts – but this then circles back to the problem of how much time you’re willing to spend there.

    And even if you are getting engagement as a writer, is it delivering on sales or boosting your readership? Or is your readership primarily other writers who buy your book in exchange for you buying theirs?

    Of course, this is more an issue of your target audience versus the audience that’s easiest to grow. It’s also about learning how best to use a platform.

    Useful apps that give you back control

    It’s not that you have to give up social media. There may be platforms you find less time-consuming and less stressful. You can also use apps to control your access.

    I recently looked at more apps I hadn’t tried before. I find some of them extremely useful.

    The most useful of all is a straight-out social media blocker like Cold Turkey which has both a free and a paid option. I’ve used the free one for years and it’s definitely worthwhile. There are others like Forest, which allows you to grow a virtual tree as an incentive to focus.

    There’s also Delayed Gratification. This allows you to customise a list of sites where you can set up a 10-second or 20-second delay before you can access them.

    So, with Twitter, you could give yourself a 20-second delay that prevents you from immediately getting into the site. When you make things harder for yourself, it helps to break the habit.

    There’s also UnDistracted which allows you to control your use of Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Reddit, and Netflix. There is the option to block each of these sites, but you can also control whether you see the feed, the trending topics, recommended videos or followers, etc. With YouTube, you can force-direct to your subscriptions. Add in removal of the sidebar and recommended videos and you have fewer juicy videos to keep you distracted.

    There’s also Insight by Freedom which allows you to track your time on various sites. The bar graphs might truly shock you when you check where you’ve been spending time. Freedom also has a social media blocker, but it’s not free, apart from the trial. Insight by Freedom is free on the Google Play Store as a Chrome extension.

    There are many more useful apps. If you need to break your work time down into more manageable segments, you can use a Pomodoro timer.

    If you want to know more…

    There are a lot of interesting videos on YouTube on the subject of ‘Why I quit social media‘.

    Of course, being on YouTube means scrolling yet another site!

    But you’ll see what people have to say about quitting for months or even a year or more. How their lives changed.

    You’ll also see, particularly in the comments below, that many people who quit FB, Twitter, and Instagram choose to stay on YouTube, even though it too is designed to be addictive.

    All I can say is, beware of YouTube. It’s another rabbit hole. I think it has a lot of amazing content, which is why so many people justify still using it. But it’s best to use it in a controlled fashion. I find it useful to access YouTube via my TV because then I treat it as an alternative to real television (which I have little to no interest in).

    I also recommend checking out any talks Dr. Cal Newport gives on social media addiction. There are also whistleblowers from social media companies who have spoken out about the problems.

    Otherwise, I have some openings in my developmental editing calendar. You can opt for an opening chapters edit, a manuscript critique, an advanced beta critique, or a full developmental edit.

    You can check my editing services page.

    More posts from the blog

    Pressing the reset button

    Boost your writing with the Pomodoro technique

    Social media blockers

  • Blogging, Writing Advice

    Pressing the Reset Button

    Pressing the reset button

    Do you ever feel that you spend too much time online? Are you getting as much writing done as you’d like? Do you feel your attention span is suffering? Are your writing sessions fragmented by constantly checking social media?

    For that matter, do you ever feel like you could do with a break from both social media and writing?

    I’ve been thinking recently about the concept of pressing a reset button. Before social media, there were activities I engaged in regularly that have since fallen by the wayside. And before I joined Twitter, I was getting on with learning new tunes on my wire harp.

    Sadly, Twitter put the kibosh on that. In fact, it set me back years. If I’d never gone on Twitter, I would have achieved a lot more. Not just in playing a musical instrument, but in working on my writing, taking rest breaks, and so much more. I used to watch a lot of foreign language films. But after reading stuff online I found I didn’t feel as eager to read subtitles anymore.

    When I look back to the 1990s, the distractions of the 21st century just weren’t there.

    And it’s not that the internet is completely a bad thing. If you have a hobby you want to take up, there’s loads of useful information. The problem is there’s so much information and options that it can be paralysing.

    Social media blockers are great for silencing distractions, but they can also be frustrating in the short term. This is because the pull of social media takes time to resist. I’ve used a three-week blocker in the past – I got a lot more done in that period. Likewise, when I temporarily deleted my Twitter account for nearly 30 days, after the first week it seemed more of a relief than anything.

    One thing I decided to try was mentally listing the things I liked doing as a kid. Then I crossed out anything that was no longer feasible or of interest. This took me back to playing a musical instrument, for one thing. It’s not that I want to be a performer. But I do think it’s a great way of switching off the chattier side of the brain. Armed with a wire-strung lyre a relative bought me for Christmas, I’ve been working on the kind of tunes I hope to get back to playing on my harp. The advantage of the lyre is it’s smaller and I keep it beside me when I’m at my desk.

    If I want a few minutes break from editing, I pick up the lyre and practise the current tune.

    I’m also trying to do more reading for pleasure. Reading fiction is part of my job, which sometimes makes it harder to read books for relaxation.

    I’ve returned to daily walks. Sometimes I go out twice a day. There’s nothing like fresh air and exercise. There are other old interests and hobbies I’d like to revisit. But there’s always the same danger of ending up scattered and overloaded.

    So, for now, I will pluck the strings of my new lyre and learn some new tunes.

    Need a developmental edit or critique?

    Otherwise, I am currently coming to the end of two edits, so there’s room in my schedule for new clients. If you fancy an advanced beta read, an opening chapters developmental edit, a full developmental edit, or a manuscript critique, drop me an email at karen@indiecateditorial.com. I also edit novel outlines for those who want to plan out their book chapter by chapter before they write out the story in detail.

  • Writing, Writing Advice

    #NaNoWriMo Burnout

    #NaNoWriMo burnout
    #NaNoWriMo burnout

    Are you currently engaged in National Novel Writing Month? Have you been furiously writing away and watching your word count build as the days go on? With the middle of the month approaching, maybe you’re already suffering from #NaNoWriMo Burnout?

    Maybe you’ve even fallen behind or dropped out. Due to that one or two days when you couldn’t get any writing done… You felt like you’d failed and you dropped out.

    Or maybe you picked up your thread again, but those missing days still bug the hell out of you.

    Don’t heap unnecessary pressure on yourself

    The truth is, with everything else that’s going on – Covid, lockdowns, restrictions, job worries – you don’t need the added stress of writing obligations.

    Or a feeling that you’ve somehow failed.

    #NaNoWriMo is great for getting people engaged in an activity for a fixed period of time, where you can also talk to other participants.

    But if you find it’s all getting too much, it’s perfectly okay to drop out.

    Your health is more important than a word count

    First of all, your health and wellbeing come first. Secondly, your writing won’t necessarily benefit from you feeling stressed out and under some kind of obligation to produce.

    If you feel that NaNoWriMo is the boot up the backside you need to get you motivated, there are others ways to get the same results. And they don’t involve the same short-term pressures.

    If you can find a writing group – including an online writing group – that would certainly help motivate you.

    You could also try and find some accountability partners. It can be one or two and then check in with them periodically. Set reasonable goals for the next check-in.

    Never set unreasonable goals. You’re just setting yourself up to fail and feel bad about it.

    And that can keep you trapped in a negative downward cycle of ‘what’s the point’ and ‘I can’t do this’.

    One technique I found helpful in the past

    One thing I’ve found helpful in the past is writing down a word count for each day. Even if it was just 30 words. Tiny word counts were fine because there were other days when the count would be in the thousands.

    Momentum was the key.

    I could count up the words at the end of each month, each quarter, each half-year, and each year.

    Over the years, the overall word count went up dramatically.

    At first, there was novelty and enthusiasm. Then there was the sense of obligation and the grind of having to do it. This is why even allowing small word counts can help. After a while, I had to write and if I didn’t there was a feeling of dissatisfaction. I didn’t associate it with a sense of failure or duty either. It had more to do with the feeling that writing was such a part of my daily life that I missed it and didn’t feel right when it wasn’t there.

    Nevertheless, we’re all allowed breaks.

    If you feel that a month of writing isn’t for you, it’s fine to take a step back. Never mind what other people are doing. Writing is not a competition – though it might feel like it is sometimes when you’re on social media.

    Still intent on finishing #NaNoWriMo?

    If you’re feeling a bit burned out, but you still want to continue, remember to take breaks. Go for a walk. Listen to music.

    If you need help concentrating, you can use a social media blocker like Cold Turkey.

    You can also use a Pomodoro timer to pace yourself.

    Whatever you write this month is just a jumping-off point, not the end goal. You can rework it later. Or even run off with a side character and live happily ever after in a new plot/novel!

    More posts from the blog

    You need author photos but you’re camera shy

    Social media blockers

    Is dialogue ruining your scenes?

    Boost your writing with the Pomodoro technique

  • Developmental Editing, Writing Advice

    Should you dust off that old novel?

    Blog image for Should you dust off that old novel?
    Should you dust off that old novel?

    I’m currently analyzing a novel that received very fast agent attention some years ago.

    Later it piqued the interest of literary scouts. There was international interest. But in spite of the initial promise, the novel failed to get an English-language deal. And because of this, the international publishers didn’t take it either.

    The main issue was that it needed a developmental editor.

    A common piece of advice is to ditch a rejected novel and get on with the next one. This is not bad advice in the short term. But it could be a mistake to ditch it forever.

    How to decide if your book is worth saving

    Here are some things to consider:

    • Did the novel show a lot of promise?
    • Have you had positive feedback since on its potential?
    • Do you now have the skillset to address any problems and fix them?
    • Do you want to rewrite the book? (If you don’t, then that’s the end of the matter.)
    • Market trends might also factor into whether it’s time to rework that book
    • Taking a few years out before re-examining the book is also instructive – it’s hard to read your own novel with fresh eyes at the best of times
    • Is this book similar to other books you have written or intend to write? (If it is, that would be a plus.)

    It’s understandable that some books are not worth revisiting.

    But when a huge amount of effort has been invested, as well as research, and the problems can be identified, it seems a shame to close the door on a rewrite.

    After all, revisiting the book is like meeting up with old friends… visiting old haunts. But you also get to meet new people and new places as the new draft takes hold.

    Identify the problems and the solutions

    In the case of this novel, the central issues lie in a problematic triad of structure/location/viewpoint. It’s a classic example of how changing one thing – viewpoint – could actually change the structure of the entire book.

    If the main character is telling the story, the reader can only know what they know and hear things when they hear them.

    This can have a very negative impact on story structure, pushing a lot of twists and revelations towards the latter part of the book.

    And this in turn creates structure and pacing problems.

    This is what happened with the book I’m currently looking at.

    Multiple third-person POVs would make a huge difference, freeing up the narrative. The plot structure would be more balanced. And information, revelations, and so on, more evenly spread through the book.

    If a book has a strong central voice, it might be difficult to let go of it and try something new. But if you really want to give your book a second chance, it will be necessary to change some things.

    This writer intends to rework their book.

    But for other writers in the same boat, the question is, do you want to rescue your novel or not? If you’d rather keep it as it is, and you’re okay with it not being published, then you can leave it. But if you want to publish it, it’s best to look at what can be improved.

    The advantage of returning to an old manuscript

    Here’s the beauty of working on an old manuscript:

    • You know the characters already
    • You know their backstories already
    • You know the locations already
    • You know the plot and subplots already

    So, you don’t have to start from scratch. You already have this information in your head.

    You just need to have the objectivity to know what’s best to keep and what to throw out. Hopefully, your writing skills will have improved enough that you can pull off a good rewrite.

    Never use the old manuscript as a roadmap

    But here’s something to avoid – dusting off your manuscript and using it as the basis of the rewrite.

    What you should really do is read it over and make notes on what works and what doesn’t work. There are things you previously thought were important – maybe you’d happily ditch those things now.

    What is worth keeping? What do you wish you’d done differently?

    Write up a rough plan. Then put the old draft aside and start again.

    Give yourself the freedom to start from scratch. Where you find your enthusiasm flagging, you might have stumbled on something that doesn’t work so well anymore.

    Where your enthusiasm picks up – that’s something worth keeping, or maybe just something new and exciting!

    The thing about tackling an old manuscript is you’ve already done the research and planning. You don’t need to plot the whole thing out again unless you have serious plot holes.

    Maybe the plot is great but it’s let down by the choice of viewpoint or the order of the scenes. Or there’s something off with the structure.

    Or maybe you started your novel in the wrong place and this set off a chain reaction right through the novel. And now you can see how to fix it.

    Not everyone wants to write a lot of novels. Some people would rather write fewer books and spend more time on them.

    One approach is not better than the other. Writers are all just different. This is not a competition.

    Should you dust off that old novel?

    It really comes down to whether you’d want to spend more time with the characters and that world.

    It also depends on the value of the manuscript. If it received positive attention from industry professionals, that might suggest it’s worth revisiting.

    Of course, you could just go down the indie route and publish it yourself.

    But if you want to have another go submitting it to agents, you could put it aside for a while. Even better if it’s been lying around for a few years. The more objectivity you have, the easier you will find it to spot the strengths and weaknesses.

    If you try to rewrite the manuscript by closely following the previous draft, you’re in danger of making the same mistakes again. Because the old draft exerts a certain gravitational pull – where you end up repeating too many things from before.

    In fact, tinkering could actually be harder than throwing out the previous draft (metaphorically) and starting again. Constantly referring to the old draft takes up too much time.

    Open a new file. Here’s your fresh start.

    You know your main plot and characters already. You are free to make any changes you wish. You are free to change the name of your characters, their appearance, and so many other things.

    You can make things better. Use the skills you’ve learned since the last draft.

    This is your second chance.

    Useful links

    If you want to check out my editing services, I offer developmental editing, manuscript critiques, beta reads, and custom reports. If you don’t see the particular custom critique service you’re after, you can email me at: karen@indiecateditorial.com

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    How to establish a writing routine
    Social media blockers